You are my Density
by Nifteee
Summary: This story explores a possible alternate ending to the game. A little bit of fluff. A little bit of the supernatural. Numerous references to the Back to the Future movie, for better or worse.


_**One night in the year 2007...**_

The two girls huddled together before the tall narrow bookshelf, both of them with hands on knees and their heads tilted as they surveyed the rather extensive DVD collection of the Price household.

Max started off the nomination process with a surefire Chloe-pleaser. "How about Bladerunner?"

"Ooo!" Chloe's eyes grew for a moment, then simmered down. "Mmm, it's only been three or four weeks since we last watched that. I'm feeling like something a little lighter tonight. Not so heavy and serious on the philosophy, you know?"

"Oh, okay." Max looked back to the bookcase. "Mmm, what about Hellboy? That movie's kind of silly!"

"Hmm." Chloe stuck out her hand to reach for the Hellboy DVD, but the fingers stopped well short. "I dunno, that's a fun movie, but it's more of a fantasy movie than a sci fi movie, and I'm kind of in a sci fi mood..."

Max straightened up, drawing her spindly self up to her full height so that she stood as tall as her hunched best friend. "You have a movie in mind already, don't you?"

"As a matter of fact, I do!" Chloe straightened up and rubbed her hands in a conspiratorial manner as her voice lowered to a hush. "I got a hold of a movie today from Steph and it looks freaking awesome!"

Chloe's excitement was contagious, and Max furtively glanced towards the staircase which led up to the second floor where William, Chloe's dad, was most likely reading a book in bed.

"Sweet! What movie is it?"

Chloe grinned as she yanked out a bootleg DVD from underneath her shirt, the DVD tucked away inside her pants waistband. The DVD cover was nowhere near professional looking, just a piece of folded printer paper with a grayscale image that Stephanie Gingrich had scanned onto it. But the image was quality enough that Max could see two men standing in ominous military coats with matching pistols in their hands, and the movie title _Equilibrium_ between them.

"Check it out, Max!" Chloe thrust out the DVD for Max's inspection, as she added unneccesarily, "Equilibrium!"

"Oh! What's it about?" Max peered at the cover and read out loud the printed text. "Christian Bale. Taye Diggs. In a future where freedom is outlawed, outlaws will become heroes."

"Steph said that this movie has the coolest and most awesome gun battles ever! And Christian Bale is a total hottie as well, see?" Chloe held the DVD even closer to Max's face, as if to use Christian Bale's handsome dour face in an attempt to bewitch Max into doing her bidding.

"Yeah, I see," said Max, although really, she didn't see. Awesome movie fights were awesome, of course, but Max honestly didn't get the big deal about Christian Bale. But to each their own, she supposed, as her eyes traveled toward the bottom left of the DVD cover.

Then she gasped. "Chloe! This movie is rated R!"

"Yup!" Chloe beamed. "That's how you know it's gonna be awesome!"

Max slowly backed away from the DVD as if it bore venomous fangs. "Your parents and my parents don't want us watching rated R movies!"

"Nuh uh, that's not true! They let us watch Bladerunner and that's rated R!"

"That's the exception, not the rule! Heck, Mom and Dad only started letting me watch PG-13 movies last year!"

"Well, our parents make exceptions for good movies, and I'm sure they'll make an exception for this movie as well!"

Chloe said this with such confidence that Max had to ask, "Have you asked your dad if we could watch this movie?"

"Uh." The strawberry blonde girl scratched her head. "Not yet. But we can ask him after we watch it!"

"Chloe!"

"We can keep the volume down while we watch! Dad isn't moving from his room for a couple hours anyway, Mom's shift isn't over until eleven."

Max opened her mouth, then closed it. She looked down at the DVD cover and its tantalizing letter R. Then she huddled closer to Chloe and whispered, "Ok, let's ask afterward!"

"Hee hee!" Chloe and Max shared conspiratorial smiles as Chloe cracked open the DVD case, pulled out the disc, and popped open the DVD tray.

"Good evening, ladies!"

Max jumped and Chloe spun about at the sound of William's unexpected voice as Chloe's father walked into the living room putting on his coat.

Chloe immediately slid over to hide the DVD case resting on top of the open DVD player behind her back. "Hey dad! Whatcha doing down here!"

"Oh, your mother called earlier, said her shift ends early tonight. So, I'm going to head on over and pick her up! Now where did I put those keys..." He looked over at the brightly smiling Chloe and the frozen pale faced Max. "You girls pick something yet for your movie night?"

"Yes," said Max.

"No," said Chloe.

Max immediately corrected herself. "Um, no. Yeah, no! No."

"Hmm?" William paused to take in Chloe's shining smile and Max's mask of guilt, not quite sure which face he should be more concerned about. "You girls sure you don't have something picked out already?"

Chloe and Max exchanged looks, afraid of contradicting each other once again, desperately trying to communicate telepathically with each other. William did well to hide his amusement as he proceeded to pull out his own DVD case from his waistband.

"Well then. Either way, I'll just leave this movie here that I picked up today to add to our little collection. I'm not saying you girls should watch it tonight, but it's a timeless classic if I do say so myself!"

He plunked down his DVD case onto the kitchen counter, and Max and Chloe peered forward at the very official looking cover art of the movie _Back To The Future_ , where a young Michael J. Fox gaped at a wristwatch while standing next to a nifty looking car on a road blazing with fire.

Chloe read out loud from where she did not dare to move: "Back to the Future?"

Max, eager to please, rushed forward to pick up the DVD. "Oh, I've heard of this movie! It's a really old one!"

William said, "Old?! It was made in 1985! Three years after Bladerunner!"

"Oh." Max made a face. "Bladerunner is an old movie too, though. Right?"

A long sigh and a quick wink from William. "Great, now you're making me feel old as well, Max."

Max offered an apologetic grin. "Sorry."

Chloe said from the DVD player, "You ARE old, Dad! No ifs or ands about it!"

"My goodness, you young whipper snappers are merciless!" William shook his head with a grin as he fished the car keys out from the crappy ash tray which Chloe had lovingly crafted for her mom recently. "I'll be back in a flash with your mom, Chloe. You two don't burn the house down now."

"Okay, see you, Dad! Drive safe!"

"Bye William!"

William walked out of the living room, the front door opened and closed, and the two girls deflated in relief.

Max immediately said, "He knows."

"Darn it!" Chloe turned around to give the Equilibrium DVD a longing look before she plucked it out of the DVD tray and put it back inside the case. "We can't watch this if Dad's coming back with Mom in the next hour! They'll see this for sure, grrr."

Max picked up the Back the Future DVD. "Let's watch this instead! I'll bet this is a great movie!"

"You just want to watch it because Dad wants us to watch it!"

"Do not! I've heard good things about the movie, that's all!" Max's face took on as combative of an expression as it ever could. "I bet that it got better reviews than Equilibrium on Rotten Tomatoes!"

Chloe scowled at Max's invocation of the almighty website which they often used to settle movie night disputes. "Pssht! Maybe in the critic reviews, all those critics do is look for the next best picture of the Oscars! I'll bet Equilibrium has better audience reviews though! It sounds like a movie of the people, by the people, for the people!"

Max gently placed the DVD back on the counter. "How about this? We'll look up the audience reviews for both movies, and whichever movie has the better rating, we watch that?"

Chloe was already running for the staircase. "Deal!"

The two girls proceeded to stampede up the stairs and into Chloe's room, where Chloe's sleeping computer awaited. A wiggle of the mouse and a bunch of furious keystrokes later, Max crowed in victory while a desperate Chloe double and triple checked the audience review ratings between the two movies.

Max did her awkward white girl celebratory dance. "Told you so, Chloe! Eat it! 94 to 81, not even close!"

"This... this can't be right! Steph said this movie was the best! This website must be totally overrun by corporate shills!" Chloe's protests were weak and feeble compared to the overwhelming righteousness oozing from her best friend, however, and the older girl finally signaled defeat when she pushed herself away from her computer.

"Fine, let's go watch Back to the Future. I mean, all those reviews can't be wrong, can they? Hey, you can stop dancing now, sheesh! Rub it in, why don't you!"

Chloe walked down the stairs, followed by a dancing Max. They split up at the bottom of the stairs so that Max could snatch up the DVD from the kitchen counter while Chloe retrieved a couple packs of microwave popcorn from a cupboard. A couple minutes later, they reunited on the couch with a giant bowl of buttery hot popcorn between them, and Max held up the DVD remote to press play.

"This movie better not suck," said Chloe, who was still smarting from the lost bet.

Max was used to Chloe being an ungracious loser. "It'll be awesome, don't worry."

"Yeah, yeah." Chloe comforted herself by jamming a handful of popcorn into her mouth. "We'll see."

As it turned out, Chloe indeed had nothing to worry about as the movie promptly swept up the two girls within its whimsical tale of time travel. Max and Chloe watched, utterly transfixed, as the story of Marty McFly and his friends and family unfolded, each of the girls uttering an occasional comment here and there.

"Whoa, that's a lot of clocks."

"Wow, Michael J. Fox was a total hottie back then." Chloe, of course.

"Biff is a total jerk!"

"Yeah, Biff sucks!"

"Doc has the craziest hair!"

"If I hit my head against the toilet, I wonder if that will make me smarter."

"Do they make cars like that anymore?"

"Oh my god, those guys killed Doc!"

"Is that his dad? I think that pervert guy is his dad!"

"Wow, his mom was a total hottie!"

"Ewwww, his mom likes him, gross!"

"Oh my god, is she touching him - that is SO gross!"

It was around this time when a keychain could be heard rustling outside, the front door unlocked, and William and Joyce entered the house as quietly as they could so as to not disturb the movie night.

Her eyes still fixated on the TV screen, Chloe called out, "Hi Mom, hi Dad!"

Max's eyes were similarly glued to the TV. "Hi Joyce, hi William!"

Joyce walked over to peck her daughter on the cheek and give Max a warm smile. "Hey girls, what are you watching tonight?"

They chimed in unison, "Back to the Future!", while William silently nodded in approval from the background.

"Oh! That's a fun movie, you're gonna love it, I guarantee it."

Chloe barely nodded. "So far so good!"

"Glad to hear that." Joyce receded back toward the staircase now. "We'll be upstairs if you girls need anything."

The girls said, "Okay!", and Joyce and William traded knowing smiles as they silently headed up the stairs...

Chloe and Max ended up watching the rest of the movie without a break or another interruption. They both screamed in frustration when Doc Brown tore up the letter of warning from Marty which would have saved the good doctor's life. They both gagged when Marty's mom kissed Marty in a most unmotherly manner, then laughed when Marty's mom realized that the kiss had felt all sorts of wrong. They both cheered when George McFly knocked out Biff with a single haymaker of a punch. They sighed in happiness when Marty's teenage parents, dancing in each other's arms, finally realized they were destined to be together. Another cheer went up when Marty finally made it back to the present. Then a resounding groan of dismay when the Libyans killed Doc Brown once again, punctuated by a little tantrum of frustration from Chloe.

"Oh my god, he should have just read the freaking letter!"

Then Chloe stopped spazzing out, and a silent happy smile was shared between the two when the movie revealed that Doc was still very much alive, thanks to the bulletproof vest he was wearing and the reassembled letter which he had torn up decades ago.

"Yay, I knew it!" Max said. "I knew he'd read the letter anyway!"

Chloe nodded as the movie started to wind down. "Yeah, I would have read it too! I mean, who cares if changing future events screws up the space time continuum! Marty had to save Doc's life!"

"Well, Marty did almost wipe out his own existence in the process," Max reminded. "I bet time travelers have to be real careful about what they do and who they interact with. I mean, it's not just their own lives they're changing, they might change so many other people's lives as well!"

Chloe started to say something, then they both hushed when they realized that Doc had returned with his DeLorean time machine for the purpose of taking Marty along for another time traveling adventure. They cackled in delight as Doc stuffed banana peels into the car's approximation of a fuel tank, then glowed in excitement when the movie ended with the DeLorean launching itself back into the future.

Max said, "Oooh, that means there's a sequel! I bet that one is awesome as well!"

"I'll ask Steph tomorrow if she can get a hold of a copy for us! I bet she can, Steph can get a copy of anything!"

"So, what did you girls think of the movie?"

Chloe and Max turned their heads to see the disembodied head of William sticking out over the staircase railing.

"It was awesome!" they answered in one voice.

"Sweet! A timeless classic, I tell ya!" William grinned. "Have any favorite parts of the movie?"

The girls mentally scratched their heads, then Max ventured forth, "My favorite part was when the Libyans shot Doc, but he lived anyway! I'm so glad he read the letter!"

Chloe had decided on her favorite scene. "My favorite part was when Marty's dad punched the daylights out of Biff's stupid face!"

"Yeah, that was awesome too! Screw Biff, that asshole got what was coming to him!"

"The Johnny B. Goode scene was really funny too! Oh, and 'you are my density', hahaha! It was so funny when Marty's dad tried to hit on Marty's mom in the diner! Oooh, you are my density, destiny, whatever!" Chloe turned to Max and tried her darndest to activate a pair of bedroom eyes. "Hey Max..."

Max blinked at Chloe's heavy lidded eyes and suddenly husky voice, and her own voice suddenly scrabbled within her throat. "Wh-what?"

Chloe slinked forward on her arms, closing in on the wide-eyed Max like how a cobra would corner a quivering field mouse, the mouse helplessly entranced by the cobra's mesmerizing stare.

"Max... my density has brought me to you..."

Max unintentionally followed the script, as she thickly repeated: "What?"

Chloe batted her eyelashes, and her body, thoroughly swaddled in blue plaid pajamas, twisted this way and that in the most lampoonish of seductive maneuvers, struggling somewhat within the comfy confines of her fleece blanket, as she whispered, "I'm Chloe... Chloe Price... and I am your destiny."

Throughout their short lifetimes so far, the two girls had already run through thousands of stupid jokes together. Done and said thousands of stupid silly things to each other, traded hundreds of whispered secrets of both the important and non-important variety (mostly non-important, though). Chloe and Max were only ages thirteen and twelve, respectively, but Max had already fallen under the impression that the two girls knew each other so well by now, neither could ever do or say anything which would surprise the other.

Tonight, Chloe was just being silly as usual. Just Chloe being Chloe. They had traded countless reenactments during previous movie nights, and they would continue to trade movie night reenactments for another year or so. And yet, when her best friend leaned forward with bewitching eyes and shining lips to repeat that silly anagram, Max's ears, face, neck, seemingly everything blossomed into a rosy heated red underneath her own fleece blanket, as something stirred deep within her. Something unexpected, something thrilling, something frightening. Possibly taboo. Almost illuminating.

Still too young to fully understand what she was experiencing, at least Max was still old enough to realize when Chloe was being a clown. The red faced Max reached for the nearest sofa cushion, picked it up, and proceeded to smush Chloe's serpentine face with said cushion.

"Chloe, stop being stupid!"

Chloe's muffled voice issued forth from the cushion: "Auuugh! My density, why you do this!"

The would-be seducer retreated back to her own half of the sofa while William's cackling floated down from the stairs. Chloe crossed her eyes a bit as she rubbed her tender nose, then pointed a jubilant finger towards Max's pink face.

"Hah, Max! Look at your face! Damn, I'm good!"

"Whatever, you dope!" Max dropped the sofa cushion and deflected towards someone other than Chloe. "Hey William, what was your favorite part of the movie?"

"Ohhh gosh, that's a tough question." William's disembodied face wrinkled in deep thought. "Like you girls already said, George knocking out Biff was awesome. Johnny B. Goode, the density versus destiny scene, the skateboard sequence, the clock tower and the lightning storm, too many things ruled about that movie! Oh, and can't forget that moment when Marty's mom kissed Marty, hahaha!"

The girls promptly reunited in their mutual disgust with William's last choice: "Ewwww!"

Chloe added, "Dad, you are such a troll! I'm honestly shocked we live in a house and not under a bridge!"

"Hey, you asked, I answered! Not my fault!" His ears now perked up, as if hearkening to a distant call. "Ah, speaking of kissing and mothers, I think it's about time I went back to bed and kissed your mother goodnight, oh hoh hoh!"

"Oh my god, Dad, you're so gross!" Chloe grabbed up her own sofa cushion and fired it at her father's face with a remarkable accuracy made possible by previous practice. "Go to bed already, this movie night is girls only!"

A disembodied hand joined William's disembodied head just in time to catch the hurtling cushion. "As you wish, my lady! You girls have a good night, don't stay up too late!"

Chloe growled and Max chimed, "Good night!"

The head, the hand, and the sofa cushion disappeared over the staircase railing and into the darkness. The girls turned back to the ending credits scrolling on the TV and started to clean up the moderate mess they'd made on the living room table...

Half an hour later, the time dinged eleven o'clock, the official bedtime of the Price household. The first floor was dark and uninhabited, popcorn bowl and drinking cups washed, dried, and put away. The two girls were inside Chloe's room upstairs, under the covers of her queen sized bed, their mouths minty fresh from brushing their teeth. The Equilibrium DVD was stashed safely somewhere within the depths of Chloe's closet. The lamp was still on, but the computer was off. The neighborhood was a good one, a quiet suburb, barely any car traffic at this time of night. The house was still, save for the two girls whispering to each other.

Max was staring up at the ceiling, blanket pulled up to her chin. "Chloe, I just realized something."

Chloe propped up her head with her hand and elbow. "What is it?"

Max turned her head to Chloe. "Your dad was making a pun when he said that Back to the Future was a timeless classic."

Chloe's eyes flew open at this revelation, and she slammed a fist into her pillow. "Oh my god, he was! He pulled a fast one and snuck it right by me, I didn't even realize it!"

Max grinned from where she was. "You use puns all the time, what's the big deal?"

"My puns are totally different from his puns! My puns are totally cool and funny, while his are totally lame!"

"Uh huh." Max went back to grinning at the ceiling. "I think his puns are funny too."

"My puns are better though, right? Right?"

Max visibly shrugged underneath the covers. "Sometimes."

"Only sometimes?" Chloe regarded Max as if she were Judas himself.

Max's grin widened. "Ok, most of the time."

"Thought so!" A triumphant Chloe flopped back onto her pillow. "It's funny, Michael J. Fox looked so young back then, I could almost buy that he was supposed to be a high schooler in the movie!"

"I know, right? It's so sad that he has that Parkinson's disease thing! I read that it isn't a fatal condition or anything in itself, so at least it's manageable, I think."

"Yeah, I heard the quality of life kinda goes down the drain with that disease, but he seems ok whenever I see him on TV. I guess he has the money to help deal with that kind of condition."

"Yeah..." Max then thought out loud, "You know, the actor and actress who played his parents, they looked really young too! I could almost believe they were high school age as well!"

"They did, didn't they! The wonders of movie makeup and magic!" Chloe's face and voice became secretive now. "You know what's kinda weird?"

"What?"

"I dunno why, but I kinda thought Marty's dad was cuter than Marty himself."

"Really?" Max turned her entire body to face Chloe now. "Well, I get what you mean, but they're all actors and they're all good looking, so I don't think it's really that weird."

"Yeah, true, but even when he was acting all quiet and nerdy – heck, even pervy – during the high school scenes, I dunno, I thought it was really cute, the way he behaved around his future wife."

"Oh, it totally was!" Max nodded in agreement. "You could totally tell that he liked her and cared for her! He was kinda being a little creepy in the beginning, though, peeping from the tree and all."

Chloe waved off Max's concerns. "Yeah, but I bet boys do stupid stuff like that all the time. Like Mom always says, boys will be boys!"

"Yeah, but when she says it, she's usually talking about your dad."

"Well, that's because Dad is an overgrown boy himself!" Chloe scowled and grinned at the same time, then mused, "You know, if a really cute boy walked up to me tomorrow and said that he was my destiny, like how Marty's dad said it, I think I'd like that a lot. I wouldn't believe him, but I think I'd like it."

Something akin to panic sparked within Max's chest for no particular reason, but she chalked it up to that heady excitement a preteen is supposed to feel when privately discussing a member of the opposite gender. "I guess I'd like it too. I dunno, though, weren't they total strangers when he first told her that he was her destiny? That's kinda weird, don't you think?"

"Mmm, I don't think they were total strangers, or at least, I think she recognized him or knew his name." Chloe chortled as she recalled the lines once again, "I am your density... I mean... your destiny..." She sighed with an unexpected wistfulness. "I dunno, I really liked the way he said it. His awkwardness was really charming."

"Is there, uh, a boy out there who you'd like to hear that from?"

Chloe blinked at Max's unexpected question. "I, uh... huh, you know what? Right now, not really. I mean, maybe Trevor? He's cute." Chloe's eyes suddenly flew open. "Oh wait, I know! Christian Bale!"

"Christian Bale?"

"Yeah, Christian Bale! He's soooo hot!"

"Hah! I'll let him know that you're saving yourself for him, no problem."

"No need, I'd tell him myself if I had the chance! Heck, I'd tell him to his face that I'm both his density and destiny! Who says only boys can say that sort of stuff!"

"Yeah!" said Max. "I could totally see myself saying that if I thought that person was the right one for me!"

"You know what, let's have a bet!"

"What kind of bet?"

"I bet that I'll tell someone I'm his destiny before you tell someone you're his destiny!"

"Oh my god, Chloe, that's such a stupid bet! That sort of thing isn't a race or contest, you can't just force it down someone else's throat!"

"I wouldn't be forcing anything down anyone's throat! If you really believe someone is that special someone, I think it's better to let them know, right?"

"I mean, sure, if you really believe it, but you can't predict when that sort of thing happens! It happens when it happens, you can't control that kind of stuff! That's why it's so stupid to bet over something like that!"

"Nuh uh, if anything, that makes it more fun! It's way more fun to bet over something you don't have any control over!"

"Whatever, I guess." Max rolled her eyes. "Either way, we both know I'll win the bet."

Chloe's eyes flared at that. "Ohhh really! And what makes you say that?"

"Because I win the majority of our bets!"

"You do not!"

"Seriously, Chloe, I think it's like 60-40 in my favor right now, if not higher."

"Total bull! 50-50 at best for you!"

"Really? I just won the movie night bet we had tonight!"

"Oh my god, Max, availability heuristic much? One night does not a lifetime make!"

"I was just using that as an example! I'm totally ahead on the scorecards and you know it!"

"Uh huh, well, you know there's only one way to truly find out who would win this bet." Chloe stuck out a hand. "Shake on it, mister."

Max accepted without hesitation. "You're on, buddy."

They firmly shook hands, sealing the deal. Then they let go and stared in silence at each other...

Chloe then said, "Welp, that was easy! Now all we gotta do is go out there and find our special someones! Shouldn't be too hard, we've got all the time in the world, right?"

Max grinned. "It'll be easy peasy, mac 'n cheesy!"

"Oh god, now you're making me hungry." Chloe flopped back onto her side of the bed, rubbing her belly. "Maybe Mom won't mind if I raid the fridge right now?"

"Uh, I'm pretty sure she'll mind. It's way too late to be eating real food anyway, you'll have bad dreams and stuff."

"Yeah, yeah." Chloe tried to fight off a yawn, but gave in and let out a yowl of exhaustion. "I'm too tired to eat anyway. Lights off?"

Max nodded. "Lights off."

Chloe grinned as she reached for the bedside lamp. "Night, Max."

Max grinned back. "Night."

The lamp went click, the room went dark, and the two girls curled up inside their blankets towards each other, their tired eyes blissfully closed. Soon they were fast asleep.

One girl dreamed about finding a brand new truck in her garage, just like Marty McFly's. Shiny black, Toyota tough, four wheel drive. Her father commented that it didn't have a turbocharger, though. But hey, just her luck! A brand new turbocharger was sitting in a corner of the garage, ready for installation! And so she and her father promptly popped the hood and went to work, side by side, turning her already cool truck into the coolest ride of all the bay.

The other girl found herself inside the DeLorean time machine, strapped into the driver's seat with the engine throbbing and all gauges reading go. No Doc, no Libyans, no Chloe, nobody else. Just her, Maxine McFly. A staggeringly huge typhoon loomed before her, blotting out the entire sky. The icy winds howled, barely muted by the glass and steel, rocking the DeLorean where it stood. Hailstones cracked like bullets against the windshield. The air smelt of death, destruction, rebirth, cleansing.

She was not afraid, for she knew what she had to do She smiled, lowered her sunglasses over her eyes, and punched the gas pedal, mighty engine roaring to life. The car leaped forward at her bidding, tires screaming as it shot down the road toward the yawning maw of the storm, speedometer quickly racing toward that all important eighty eight miles per hour.

 _ **To be continued...**_

 _Author's note: When I first started playing Life Is Strange a couple weeks ago, I didn't anticipate that I would end up writing fan fiction for the game. But of course, like many other players of the game, I ended up with that good old PLiSD afterward. I do like to write, however, so it only seemed natural that I should cope with PLiSD by writing about it!_

 _Feedback, suggestions, comments, they're all totally welcome!_


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